https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQlGj5pHJVk Paul Beckwith on how to keep informed, were the strongest wind is in a hurricane, google earth as info on how high a ground is; most of Florida may end up under water-damages in the hundreds of billions....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyja1mc-W6s DAHBOO77; some nuclear plants shut down, people trying to leave Florida-once the storm starts you do not want to be in a car ! Jose could follow Irma on its way to Florida. Chemical leakages may make hit regions unliveble...

The hurricane Irma that is expected to make a landfall in the United States, is going to "devastate" the country, the chief of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) said on Friday.

FEMA Administrator Brock Long said at a press conference that the hurricane will leave portions of Florida without electricity for days, adding that over 100,000 residents of the state will need shelter.

DJ-of course these weather-disasters are climate change related and (for that reason) not only a US problem. A economic crisis in the US due to these events is a global problem. Weather disasters are reported around the globe. To deal with that-trying to limit damage only international cooperation can mean enough.

Que sera, sera, Whatever will be, will be, The future is not ours to see, Que sera, sera !

Economic loss estimates

Based on current damage estimates made by multiple agencies, Hurricane Harvey is likely to be at least the second-most costly natural disaster in U.S. history, behind only Hurricane Katrina in 2005.[5][125]Moody's Analytics has estimated the total economic cost of the storm at $81 billion to $108 billion or more; most of the economic losses are damage to homes and commercial property.[5]USA Today reported an AccuWeather estimate of $190 billion, released August 31.[126] On September 3, Texas state governor Greg Abbott estimated that damages will be between $150 billion and $180 billion, surpassing the $120 billion that it took to rebuild New Orleansafter Katrina.[127][128] According to weather analytics firm Planalytics, lost revenue to Houston area retailers and restaurants alone will be approximately $1 billion. The Houston area controls 4% of the spending power in the United States.[129]

A significant portion of the storm's damages may be uninsured losses. Regular homeowner insurance policies generally exclude coverage for flooding, as the National Flood Insurance Program underwrites most flood insurance policies in the US.[130][131] Although the purchase of flood insurance is obligatory for federally guaranteed mortgages for homes within the 100-year flood plain, enforcement of the requirement is difficult and many homes, even within the 100-year flood plain, lack flood insurance.[130] In Harris County, Texas—which includes the city of Houston—only 15% of homes have flood insurance policies issued by the NFIP. Participation in the NFIP is higher, but still low, in neighboring Galveston (41%), Brazoria (26%), and Chambers Counties (21%).[130]

5. Climate change

Climate change gathers force. The evidence of the damage inflicted by man-made global warming grows stronger. "As recently as a decade ago, climate scientists had a motto that 'you can't attribute any single extreme event to global warming'," wrote three climate scientists in the Scientific American this week.

"By the time politicians and journalists started repeating that line, however, the science had moved on, so that we now can attribute individual events in a probabilistic sense," according to Michael Mann, Thomas Peterson and Susan Joy Hassal. "We know that the strongest storms are getting stronger, with roughly 8 meters per second increase in wind speed per degree Celsius of warming.

"And so it is not likely to be a coincidence that almost all of the strongest hurricanes on record (as measured by sustained wind speeds) for the globe, the Northern Hemisphere, the Southern Hemisphere, the Pacific, and now, with Irma, in the open Atlantic, have occurred over the past two years."

The UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres is due to meet Donald Trump next week and is expected to try to persuade him to keep the US committed to the Paris carbon treaty. If the evidence of Irma doesn't make an impression on Trump, it's hard to know what could. After all, it's received a lot of coverage.

The problem is, our current business-as-usual trajectory takes us to a world that’s about 3.5C warmer. That is to say, even if we kept the promises we made at Paris (which Trump has already, of course, repudiated) we’re going to build a planet so hot that we can’t have civilisations. We have to seize the moment we’re in right now – the moment when we’re scared and vulnerable – and use it to dramatically reorient ourselves. The last three years have each broken the record for the hottest year ever measured – they’re a red flashing sign that says: “Snap out of it.” Not bend the trajectory somewhat, as the Paris accords envisioned, but simultaneously jam on the fossil fuel brakes and stand on the solar accelerator (and also find some metaphors that don’t rely on internal combustion).

Que sera, sera, Whatever will be, will be, The future is not ours to see, Que sera, sera !

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEYJdwgipus MrMBB333 with an update on "the disaster after the disaster". With 13 million households without electricity, maybe for a longer period, schools closed, roads blocked, farmland flooded-the damage must be large. Also a question on "what happened with the water".

They might destroy the U.S, but they could certainly wipe out most of the South. The total cost in funding from .gov for Harvey in Texas and Irma in Florida and North Carolina could exceed 30 billion dollars.

So what happens, as two more move closer if every year we have these kind of disasters in the South?

There will not be the rush to finance aid we have seen for Hurricane Harvey in Texas. While they may not destroy the U.S. they could certainly cripple the budget. Indirectly, if we see conditions resulting without power (electricity) or adequate medical or police coverage, you will see looting, disease, and more anarchy in the streets.

With more cyclones, hurricanes etc shippinglanes will get disrupted-transport of goods more expensive. Climate change will effect foodproduction. Irma and Harvey means loss of agriculture land and products.

Luckily, up until now, there have been no hurricanes in the Uk. So, when we do get them, as we will eventually, they will not reach category 5. Well probably not, anyway.

Buildings here tend to be stone, brick and concrete. there are few wooden houses, Timber framed buildings are getting more common, but we have got a stone one with 3 feet thick walls - deliberately.

We are only 10 miles from the coast, but quite high. So, as long as our buildings are fairly robust we should be fine, no matter what. We own the highest point around, but our house is 30 or 40 foot below that . Above us are dense trees - needed to prevent landslides in my opinion. Lots of new build stuff seems to be, not only timber frame, but also in low lying coastal areas, or on valley sides where they have removed the trees above. STUPID!

What is it like where you are? How are sea/wind defenses? Holland always struck me as low - but with great planning and defensive thinking. Will you be OK when it all goes pear shaped?

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